I'm writing a novel. I know what you're thinking. You're yawning or have already scrolled away and moved on. Great, sure, awesome. Everyone's freaking writing a novel. Whatevs. The great American thingy has been relegated to "if you have enough time on your hands" status. Shheeez. Finish it yet?
If somehow it gets mentioned around cocktails and stuffed mushrooms that I'm attempting something I probably have no business attempting, this is what I hear: "My uncle tried doing that once." Or "Spend a lot of time doing that?" Or "I really like that shirt."
Anyhoo, I've been working on my thingy since . . . oh, hell, I don't know. I'm embarrassed. I think I've finished it about four or sixty times. I've sent at least 300 query letters to agents who have no idea who I am and have no reason to care. I came close a few times to getting some interest, sure. I've done a fair-to-middling job of deluding myself, shooting myself in both feet. Yep, I've come this far to actually blob about it, and got a taste of some imagined victory . . . so, I can't quit now, no way.
The movie Sideways is a writer's writer screenplay, for sure. I remember thinking how Paul Giamatti's character made me feel happy and sad all at once, with this most awesome bit of truthiness: the challenge of publishing a novel is both a downer and an upper. And it ensures better books. I hope. I think.
Do I let people know my marathon and elusive quest to finish a full length work of fiction is important to me? No, I don't. Friends and family figure I might as well sell sports cards from a shopping mall. On weekends.
But back to Sideways, the story. After we've figured out that Paul Giamatti's character's (Miles) book just isn't going to happen, Miles and his buddy -- on a quest to hook up with some ladies -- milk it anyway. Miles' buddy Jack says the two are celebrating because "the book is about to be published." Miles goes along with it. He'd been drinking and . . . well, you've seen the movie.
One of my favorite parts is when Virginia Madsen's character asks Miles to describe the novel's plot. Miles buckles under the pressure. He stammers, makes no sense, then just folds: "It's hard to summarize," he says. Every writer has said that. If they haven't, they're not writing hard enough.
Writers get bonus value in that movie, just like serious wine connoisseurs got stuff that was over my head. Here are few more nuggets, complements of the Internet Movie Database:
Reason to Keep Things to Yourself
Guy: What is the subject of your book? Nonfiction, right?
Miles: Uh, no. It's... it's a novel. Fiction.
Guy: You writing a story? Hmm. There is so much to know about this world. I think reading something that's invented or whatever: waste of time.
Reasons to Lower Expectations When Sharing Your Work
Miles: Did you read the latest draft, by the way?
Jack: Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Miles: And?
Jack: It's great. I mean there are so many improvements. It's much tighter, just seems ... I don't know, more congealed or something.
Miles: Mm-hmm. What about the new ending? Did you like that?
Jack: Oh, yeah. New ending vastly superior to the old ending.
Miles: There is no new ending. Page 750 on is exactly the same.
Jack: Well ... maybe it just seemed new because everything leading up to it was so different.
On Keeping the Dream Alive
Miles: Well, the world doesn't give a shit what I have to say. I'm not necessary. I'm so insignificant I can't even kill myself.
Jack: Miles, what the hell is that supposed to mean?
Miles: Come on, man. You know. Hemingway, Sexton, Plath, Woolf. You can't kill yourself before you're even published.
Jack: What about the guy who wrote Confederacy of Dunces? He killed himself before he was published. Look how famous he is.
Miles: Thanks.
Jack: Just don't give up, alright? You're gonna make it.
Miles: Half my life is over and I have nothing to show for it. Nothing. I'm thumbprint on the window of a skyscraper. I'm a smudge of excrement on a tissue surging out to sea with a million tons of raw sewage.
Jack: See? Right there. Just what you just said. That is beautiful. 'A smudge of excrement... surging out to sea.'
Miles: Yeah.
Jack: I could never write that.
Miles: Neither could I, actually. I think it's Bukowski.
